


Help Me Polarize

by scarletrebel



Series: Commissions [4]
Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-08
Updated: 2018-07-08
Packaged: 2019-06-07 06:55:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15213638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scarletrebel/pseuds/scarletrebel
Summary: Grier hasn’t been to Io in some time. Not that Asher… Needs him, per say. Asher has surmised with little doubt by now that Grier must have been caught up in the fanciful mystery of that old exile. That’s all.So then, the real problem is that Grier is basically the only Guardian Asher can tolerate. Light knows he’s the only Guardian with the gall to pester him consistently, and the only one competent enough to get Asher the information and materials he needs with an understanding of why he needs it.The most aggravating fact of all boils down to a conclusion Asher now sits on. He misses Grier. He misses having a competent assistant, and his current research is taking a blow for it.





	Help Me Polarize

**Author's Note:**

> in which asher realises that he might need grier more than he lets on.
> 
> so mrpinstripesuit helped me out a while ago by taking up one of my emergency commissions, and as per usual this spiraled into something a lot longer than 1000-1200 words. thanks again pin! and I hope you enjoy these sad warlocks being all sad and stuff.

Io has been blissfully quiet ever since Osiris made his grand re-appearance.

Asher never thanked the man whilst he was a part of the consensus, having never really found a reason to. Personally he never bought into the heretics of the followers of Osiris all those years ago. He did read one of the ‘prophecies’ at the height of the mania (something about siblings and cleaving and an eldritch race, of no use to the gensym scribe) but couldn’t stand the iambic couplets and surmised that, rather than give Asher any of the information regarding the future of the Vex that he required, Osiris would rather seem clever.

So on the subject of gratitude, Asher hopes he never meets the Warlock in person and has to make a decision on the spot.

The only drawback, he thinks bitterly, as he stands alone and with his thoughts undisturbed ever since this blasted Red War started, is the lack of an assistant. Grier hasn’t been to Io in some time. Not that Asher… Needs him, per say. Asher has surmised with little doubt by now that Grier must have been caught up in the fanciful mystery of that old exile. That’s all.

So then, the real problem is that Grier is basically the only Guardian Asher can tolerate. Light knows he’s the only Guardian with the gall to pester him consistently, and the only one competent enough to get Asher the information and materials he needs with an understanding of why he needs it.

The most aggravating fact of all boils down to a conclusion Asher now sits on. He misses Grier. He misses having a competent assistant, and his current research is taking a blow for it.

He casts away the thought before it gets a chance to go any further.

The communications relay on his apparatus makes a noise. Where his Ghost sits idly next to the screen, its shell as brass and confining as the arm he has wrapped in a sling. He tries not to remember a time when the little light would warn him of who was getting into contact before he made the plunge. He tries not to think about it as he accepts the call.

“Asher.” Ikora says, voice stern. “We need to have yet another discussion about your decorum.”

He grunts derisively. “And yet again, Ikora, I have no idea what you’re referring to.”

“I understand how important your research is to you,” the Warlock Vanguard starts, and Asher is quietly glad he isn’t having this discussion with her face to face. “But your behaviour towards those who aid you is simply abhorrent.”

He snorts. “Are you in the business of stating the obvious now?”

He can practically feel her sneer across the galaxy. She goes on undeterred. “My youngest Warlocks look to you and see an opportunity to help and aid in the cause against our enemies. You simply have no right to speak to them in the way that you do.”

“And they have no right to bring me practically destroyed chassis’ when all I ask for several impeccable samples of radiolaria from Vex that haven’t already been shot down. Surely even your youngest Guardians can understand simple tasks, yes?”

Ikora hums. “I never thought I’d say this, but you appear grouchier than usual, Asher. Anything on your mind?”

Asher knows bait when he hears it.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

His Ghost whirs furiously. He looks down at it, that red light blinking like a struggling breath. He frowns. Of all things, he seethes to himself. Of all the timing in the galaxy.

“Asher. I understand how you must be feeling, what with Osiris’s resurgence.”

He snorts again.

“Given what I’ve been hearing from Avia, Grier and Carver are particularly wrapped up with helping Osiris on Mercury. I know Grier… Tolerates you, more than any other Guardian.” He screws his eyes shut. It’s a rare moment; these where he actually appreciates Ikora Rey and her perceptiveness.  “That’s still no excuse to take out your frustrations on other Guardians.”

“Oh, don’t think that just because _your_ mentor ran off with no regard to you that this is anything similar.”

He means it. Though, not in the way Ikora will interpret. If it gets her to leave him alone any quicker, though, she can take what she wants from the statement.

His Ghost vibrates, rattling violently. He looks down at it, next to his curled human fist.

Ikora is talking. Putting him in his place, he knows, but he doesn’t have time for this.

He cuts her off. “The next time you send incompetent Guardians to Io, have them steer clear of me,” and he shuts off communications completely.

He frowns down at his Ghost, the vibrations slow down, then stop, the red eye glowing brightly. He runs a quick diagnostic.

As he suspected, the Vex infection is nearly complete. An untrained eye would see a fully corrupted Ghost, a being of Light too far from the edge to save. And in a sense, they’d be right. His Ghost stopped talking to him long ago. Its resurrection capabilities are practically gone. But its Light remains. Asher has hoped, even bitterly pretended, that its insistent noises every now and then were an attempt at not going down without a fight.

A pit opens up in his stomach. He realises just how much he’s been dreading this day. He’s glad he’s alone.

When he woke up in the Towers hospital, he knew. His Light felt as though it had been split in half, right down the middle; leaving the Awoken as one part of a severed whole. He remembers opening his eyes and seeing his Ghost on the windowsill, feeling dread and anger and his own reckless stupidity come rushing in, but as he reached up a hand to grab it he couldn’t. His limb protested the motion. In frustration he looked down instead to where his arm _should_ be, to where a mangled piece of Vex tech sat instead. An arm. An arm that twitched in horror when his brain caught up to itself. An arm that was now his.

As he ponders, he catches his face in the screen of his equipment. He watches wrinkles unfurl on his forehead as he relaxes his white eyebrows, his mouth a permanent sneer. He lifts his hand – the real hand – to touch his eyes, inspect them, how taught they are from constantly peering, how one they used to gaze in wonder.

He takes a steady breath. His Ghost starts to tick softly, _tick, tick, tick_. He finds, suddenly, that he doesn’t know what to do with himself.

“Asher?”

“Light Above!” He yells, his head whipping up and to the side. “What could you possibly be bothering me about right–”

It’s Grier. His wide eyes are glazed over, hesitant, less bright than Asher has come to know them. Something’s wrong.

“What?” Is all Asher asks. Grier’s responding flinch reminds Asher too much of the Ghost sitting behind him, slowly dying. So he straightens himself, and asks with at least a modicum of gentleness, “What’s wrong with you?”

“I…” Grier’s wringing his hands, his shoulders pressed up tight. “Can I ask you something?”

“Well.” Asher doesn’t have time for this. But he can’t bring himself to tell Grier that, not when the younger Warlock looks so lost. “Go on.”  

Grier let’s out a wistful breath, crosses an arm over his chest to fiddle with his bond.

“Did you… Did you know Toland?”

Asher wasn’t expecting that. “Is that really your question?”

“Um,” Grier’s lip starts to tremble. He closes his eyes and turns around, mumbling. “Never mind.”

Something in Asher pulls as his Ghost’s ticking picks up in pace. He turns to watch it shake on his apparatus. _But what could you even do now, Asher?_ He asks himself. _Pick it up? Cradle it? There’s nothing to do for it. It’s going to die._

“Grier!”

The Warlock stops.

“Yes, I knew Toland.” Asher starts, and his Ghost quietens down slightly, as if it never even had an outburst. “I only worked with him a handful of times, before his research turned into obsession. I wasn’t… Quick enough, perhaps, to curb his enthusiasm when it came to the Darkness. We weren’t that close, and when his teachings and proclamations became grounds for exile I… Cut him off, you could say. Why do you ask?”

Even Asher doesn’t believe that, but Light Above he can only deal with so much guilt in one day.

Grier turns back around slowly, his face to the ground. “I knew him too.”

“What?” Asher takes a step forward before he realises what he’s doing. “That’s impossible. Toland was exiled from the City long before your time. He died in the Hellmouth. He’s gone, Grier.”

Grier laughs bitterly, so unlike him that Asher’s chest twists. “He, um… It’s a long story.”

Asher turns around, to look briefly at his Ghost again. _Tick, tick, tick,_ it goes on, that red light beginning to fade. He turns back, Grier looking over his shoulder at his set up.

“You’re busy, I can come back, its fine,” Grier says as he turns again and Asher grabs his elbow.

His brain catches up with the motion, and they both stare down, where a blue hand wraps desperately across Grier’s forearm.

“You’re not fine,” Asher says quickly. “Something is wrong, and that fool Osiris has made me so busy with the lack of Guardians coming to Io that no time would be better than now.”

Grier still isn’t looking at him. Asher lets go, but neither of them move.

“Stay, and talk, if you wish. If not, there’s an influx of Taken in the Pyramidion, and I need their movements cataloguing.”

“No,” Grier mumbles, wiping his eyes with the back of a hand. “No Taken. Not right now, at least.”

Asher balks, at least now knowing the severity of whatever Grier is struggling with.

“Grier…” Asher starts. His Ghost ticks away gently on the apparatus behind him. _Tick, tick, tick_ , as Grier takes a breath.

“You’re going to ha-a-ate me,” Grier whispers. “Or think that I was so stupid and naïve just like everyone else does–”

“Do not presume to make up my mind for me,” Asher chides. “And don’t compare me to those Guardians beneath you or the troglodytes in the Tower. I don’t think of you in the same way they do.”

Grier sobs, screws his face up and shakes his head in disagreement.

“You should,” Grier mumbles. “You p-probably should.”

Asher grunts and grabs Grier by the shoulders. The _tick, tick,_ of his Ghost slows.

“Do I look like the kind of person who has always done what they ‘should have’?”

Grier bites his lip, looking away. A moment passes. “D-Do you want me to answer that?”

“No,” Asher deadpans, though his mouth twitches into an attempt at a smile. “I want you to–”

And there he finally falters. All quick wit and dry sarcasm escape him.

What does he want? He doesn’t know, he finds as the questions pile up in his head; what does he want to do? Comfort Grier? Keep masquerading as a tired old Guardian and put him to work in some small attempt at keeping his mind off of whatever is eating him alive? Or could he even admit, that he wants to be the one to receive the help, the one to break down and tell Grier that he’s one step closer to dying. Finally.

“I want you to either talk, or,” Asher starts, unable to finish.

_Or what, Asher?_ His fireteam asks, unison voices in his head. A firm arm around his bicep pulling him away from the lake, a screaming voice telling him they need get out. Now. _Tick tick tick_ , they say and Asher screws his eyes shut, grips Grier a little tighter.

“Asher? Are you..?”

“I’m–”

“Not fine.”

Their eyes meet, Griers face at least a little more normal, softer and inquisitive and worried. Worried.

“You first.” Asher says, releasing Grier. He grunts, and motions with his Vex arm for the younger Warlock to begin.

Grier takes a breath, and exhales slowly. Asher is so fixated on the motion he doesn’t notice the _tick, tick, tick_ of his Ghost slow down to a halt.


End file.
